RXNB, has developed closed-door climate bay technology to replicate the exact environment of 50 different strains of marijuana in a controlled and sterile manufacturing environment. Alawieh, whose background is in pharmacology, has 32 patents pending on marijuana-related technologies. "People have been focused on access," he says. "But the second-wave evolution is about predictability and accountability."

Much of the technology happening in the growth market involves LED lighting, which offers growers a more sustainable sophisticated lighting source to grow indoors. Among the technology Alawieh is working on are patents that look at how to enrich the growth cycle of specific strains at the cellular level, with the potential to create crops that bloom continuously, rather than seasonally, yielding more marijuana per plant.

Alawieh has licensed RXNB's technology to CEN Biotech, an offshoot of the publicly traded company Creative Edge Nutrition, based just outside of Detroit. The company broke ground on a $12 million manufacturing facility in Ontario, Canada and plans to grow and sell 1.3 million pounds of medical marijuana this year in the Canadian market. "Everything will be completely computer-automated," says Bill Chaaban, CEO of Creative Edge Nutrition, which has made its bread and butter selling nutritional supplements and energy drinks in the U.S. "You're not going to have a guy walking around with a ponytail and jeans."

For Chaaban breaking into the Canadian market was a viable alternative to the U.S., particularly as patient accessibility grows more lax in British Columbia. But while companies like Creative Edge Nutrition can't legally grow or sell medical marijuana in the U.S., that doesn't mean they aren't preparing for the law to change. CEN Biotech also has a subsidiary in Michigan, and Chaaban is scouting locations for a U.S. manufacturing facility. "We've set it up to have the infrastructure in place for when we do see a change in federal law, so that everything is [ready]," he says.